So 1,152 megawatts of wind -- 576 to 768 machines -- would be needed to reliably provide 15% of Vermont's electricity. The absurdity goes beyond the outrageous scale for such little benefit, because if all of those turbines were actually producing power at once, most of them would have to be shut down, since base load plants can't rapidly ramp off and on.

Naturally, the industry does not want a fair process. They want one that they control, like they apparently control Scudder Parker's thinking about big wind. They want us to swallow their pablum about energy costs, jobs, and the environment and not have to show any evidence to back up their claims. They want to industrialize Vermont's mountaintops and don't want any one questioning the usefulness, much less the wisdom, of it.

Nearly 100 people in this town of 436 voters voted against "industrial" wind, no matter what these developers offered. Three hundred forty-one of our 426 residents signed petitions against this project (copies are in the governor's office). And most recently, 60 percent of Sheffield's residents said they wanted no industrial development at all on our ridge lines.

Specifically, 60 percent of Sheffieldian respondents opposed the construction of industrial wind turbines in the town. A minority (40 percent) favored them. Sheffield is not the pro-wind, pro-UPC town it is made out to be.

As much as we love the idea of renewables like wind and solar, we must keep in mind that Vermont Yankee requires far less land on which to operate. A wind farm would need 145 square miles in Vermont to produce the same electricity that Vermont Yankee does. This option would be an environmental disaster, if it were not so obviously unfeasible.
Editor's Note: Furthermore nuclear power provides requisite base load capacity while wind energy does not.

Missing from that harsh logic, however, is any evidence that industrial wind power can indeed "stem global warming's progress." With 20 percent of its electricity supposedly coming from wind, Denmark's greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise. That country has not reduced its use of other fuels despite a landscape saturated with wind turbines.

Most opponents of industrial wind don't support it anywhere. They've looked into it and found it wanting.

Mr. Nye's paean to the electric companies aside, these huge industrial generators are not silent, they are not intelligent, and they are most certainly not friends to the environment.

...since wind turbines generate at or above their average rate only a third of the time, and their output varies from minute to minute, it would not enable the reduction of other sources.

WEC is avoiding some simple truths. By passing green credits on to fossil fuel-burning companies we are in effect, allowing these companies to boost production. Boosting output of greenhouse gasses, anywhere in our region, directly effects our environment. Plain and simple.

Estimates for developing the Sheffield and Sutton project exceed $100 million. Up to two thirds of that is offset by federal subsidies, which we pay for. Over $60 million. A pretty good motivator.

The town never conducted a survey of its residents. The developers, Mathew Rubin and David Rappaport of EMDC, were the creators, and distributors of the survey, and David Rappaport, Delbert Reed, who is an employee of EMDC, his wife, Jacquelyn, and Frank Higgins were responsible for the tallying of the results.

WCAX-TV of Burlington, Vt., focused their telephone poll this week on wind energy, with all of one very leading and one almost meaningless question.

And despite Patt's irrelevant discourse on the difference between REC and cap-and-trade systems, the charge still stands that the primary driver of investment (and interest by utilities) in large-scale wind power is the potential profits from REC trading in a tight market.

But the thought of trucks rolling out of Bennington, west into New York state to pick up the wood chips to heat the schoolchildren of Bennington, and back to Bennington — while the Green Mountain National Forest sits off-limits to logging in the school’s own backyard — does not pass the common sense test.

I looked up the group's internet domain (cleanpowervt.org) information some time ago and discovered that it was registered by VPIRG. The main organizer, Tyler Edgar, is an employee of VPIRG.

I am not sure what the developers thought they would find in regard to building 330 to 420 foot high wind turbines on our ridge lines, but I welcome a process that is comprehensive and complete.

Rather than trying to dismiss the outspoken opposition by Londonderry as some sort of aberration or NIMBY like behavior, Vermonters throughout the state need to do the same careful research and homework that Londonderry has done.

Sen. Doyle's 2006 survey question asking if people were "for wind power" was about as simplistic and hence as useless as asking, "Do you want more money?"

What are not being discussed are the key characteristics of a good electricity supply: reliable, dependable, quality power at an affordable and predictable price. When we flip a light switch, start a ski lift, or turn on a factory machine, we expect -- even demand -- that electricity will flow. This can happen only if Vermont has a substantial portfolio of "base-load" power.